


They Told Me You've Touched the Face of God

by airyesther



Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Alternative Timeline, Eventual Smut, F/F, F/M, M/M, Slow Burn, Vanya Hargreeves Deserves Better, but don't count on it, just couldn't do the age difference thing so there is none, moderated teenage angst, probably
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-23
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:21:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,222
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25878106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/airyesther/pseuds/airyesther
Summary: I'm fascinated by their characters and their dynamic so this story will be mostly centered on Vanya and Number Five. The chapters will only connect to each other loosely. Enjoy :)
Relationships: Allison Hargreeves/Luther Hargreeves, Ben Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves, Diego Hargreeves & Klaus Hargreeves, Diego Hargreeves & Vanya Hargreeves, Number Five | The Boy & Klaus Hargreeves, Number Five | The Boy/Vanya Hargreeves
Comments: 4
Kudos: 42





	1. at the sound of the drums i'm gonna set you free

Life tended to pass in meaningless circles and most probably consumerism was the one to blame. Nightmarish birthdays, national holidays marked the precious time they were allowed to spend on this planet, and people modeled their life after this schedule, losing time by the second as they tried to regulate it.

One would think that Five spent more time than anyone with the contemplation of such abstract concepts as time. When in reality, time has ceased to exist for him as a concept a long time ago,

suspected Vanya.

Time could slip through his fingers but always literally and never figuratively. He could still touch it passing by, crush it like grains of sand between his fingers.

It used to surround him as a fort, locking him into its dungeon and once he figured out how to escape it, he only returned to erode the remaining parts of it, like a tireless wave of the sea.

  
For him, life didn’t proceed in linear or repetitive cyclic motions anymore.

He could consummate as many meaningful moments as he wanted, again and again, to his heart's desire.

  
Vanya poked her fork a little deeper in the slice of cake in front of her, the chocolate filling spilling out on the porcelain plate.

No wonder he seemed like someone who wants to be anywhere else but here, at this table of silent, angry teenagers struggling with their birthday cake.

  
Vanya took a contemplating glance at Diego next to her.

If he’s really gonna eat that third slice he was eyeing while still stuffing his mouth, they will sit here at least 10 more minutes because no one left the table without the permission of their Father who never missed an opportunity to boost their team spirit.

Regarding the effectiveness of his methods, by now everyone seemed to hate Diego a little more than they did at the beginning of their birthday dinner.

Klaus was the only one who seemed fairly involved in the epic fight between Diego and the cake but everyone else refused to allow Diego to be the representative of their misery.

As most of the times, he was alone in his fury, the others distancing themselves as they could; Allison and Luther got lost in each other's eyes, Ben probably numbed himself with dreaming about collage and college girls. Vanya was busy not paying attention to Five and Five himself...

Well, Vanya wouldn’t know.

God, this was exhausting.

The sound of a fork scratching an empty plate, Diego sighing victoriously although with hearable pain in his voice.

  
'Verygood'saidtheirfather, hisfigurepainting an ominousshadowonthetableas he stoodup. Didthepresentlightingevenmakethispossible?   
'Doyouwantmine? ' Vanyainterruptedhisforthcomingspeech, pushingherplatetowards Diego.

The silence was deafening for a few seconds. Diego stared back at her with glassy eyes then as in almost in a haze he tentatively reached for Vanya’s plate and that’s when all hell broke loose.

  
'Youcan’t be serious!

  
'I thinkthefucknot...

  
'Language, NumberOne!

  
'If I catchyou,Vanya, look out becauseI’mcoming...

  
'Well,thiswas self-destructiveasfuck.

VanyahastilylookedupatFive, panic was writtenall over hertinypaleface.   
'Whathave I done? 'askedhim in a pleadingvoice. Asifsheaskedfor saving undertheroofshebrought down onherself.

The table was still in chaos, apparently, Vanya’s passive-aggressiveness was the only provocation needed to set loose years of pent up pain and anger.

  
'Comeonnow'laughedFive, hischarmingfacescrunchedupwithgenuineamusement. '

We’re all tend to be a little too sensitive on our birthday.

He didn’t seem like he would know the first thing about that.

  
He disappeared and materialized next to her chair, pulled Vanya up fast. 

Their father's fury was a roaring force in the air and Vanya felt it hard to breathe as her panic increased the volume of the noise in the room.

Then she was somewhere else, in a shadowy room only lit by a table lamp.

She blinked and Five’s figure floated in her vision, silhouetted against the darkening garden the window he stood in front of looked at.

  
'Didyou... didyouteleportme here?

' What ?  ' took a  surprised look at her the boy.

' No.  You probably blocked out  for a  few seconds while we walked here.

' I  see .  ' Vanya  closed her eyes ,  gulping down  the frenzied pulsation in  her throat .

' Five ?

  
He was struggling to lit a cigarette so he took a questioning glance at Vanya without interrupting what he was doing.

  
'Darlin’?

  
Vanyawassoperchedforkindnessthatinstead of gettingembarrassedorgetting self-consciousbyhismockingtone, sheinstinctivelygavewayto a smile, herheadstill ringing fromher self-inducedpanic.

  
'Youlookdashing.

  
Five disapprovingly blew some smoke in her face, making her cough and laugh at the same time.

He DID look dashing.

In the last two years, he grew fast, getting tall and mean as boys of his age do.

Meaner, Vanya corrected her own thoughts.

His face got even more tauntingly beautiful, and the constant determined concentration that was written all over his face as a child, now occasionally give space to a lingering expression of a yearning that Vanya couldn’t quite place.

Vanya felt like an awful sister for idealizing him to this extent. Some moderated amount of condemn between siblings is not only recommended but healthy.

This whole smoking thing he did now, for example, how pretentious and stupid it was actually?

Did it have any other function than to appear more grown-up and attractive?

  
'Youlookquitehostilethere, Vanya.   
'Do I really? 'Thispickedupher interest. Peopleusuallydescribedher as emotionless.

  
'Probablynotforothersbutformeyousuredo.

  
He sat next to her, his long legs stretched in front of him, his polished shoes collecting all the light the vain moon provided through the dense shrubbery grown in front of the windows. 

He took up so much space so selfishly.

  
'Wereyouatanyplaceinterestingrecently?

  
This was a habitual question of hers and Five actually answering it was his acknowledgment of her imprisonment and isolation. He usually went into a great deal of effort to describe places and times for her.

It was an interesting dialogue between the two of them because Five was not really a storyteller and it felt excruciatingly intimate when he spoke to her like this. Vanya wanted to die of happiness whenever it happened.

Sometimes the grandest feelings are the most simple to contain and when she was with Five like this, it felt easy to carry her love for him.

Other times there was nothing more painful than coloring her sibling relationship with Five with such foreign desires and feelings.

  
'Here and there. Youwouldhavehatedit. Itwasintense, somuchcolor, dust, and noise.

  
He lowered his eyelashes, staring out at the window under them. When Vanya gathered her courage to truly look at his face, she noticed the thin blue veins running across them which only appeared when he was really exhausted or moody.

  
'Didn’tquiteworkas a distraction, like I hopeditwould. Metthisfamily, theyneededhelpwiththeirpublican, he wasterrorizingthem and abusingthegirlsformoney and I... ' he took a shakybreath. ' I justfeel like I havetosacrifice more every time I come back here. I don’thaveenoughtimetospenditthisgenerously.

  
Vanya felt her shoulders sinking deeper in her body.

  
'Quite an oxymoronisn’tit? 'saidat last whichearned a sharpglancefromFive.

  
'I don’tneedbullshitpsychologicalanalysis of mypowersVanya.

  
Sheneverheardhimrefertotime and space-travelingas a ‘power’.He usuallycalledit an abilityorsimplyattributedittohisintellect. 

It felt like he was trying to talk to her from a superhero’s position.

  
'I wasn’tgivingyouone. I wasn’tthinkingaboutyouatall in the last monthsso I don’tknowwheredoyougetthe idea that I haveready-madetheoriesaboutyou. Maybe yourproblemsarejust a littletoo... highbrowforme.

Now, this was embarrassing.

Vanya’s face grew hot, even in the shadows, Five could see it darken.

  
'You’resosmart, I guessyouwillfind out soonerorlaterwithoutmyhelpthatyou’rejustbeingincrediblyselfish.

  
'Where is thiscomingfrom? ' got upFivetoo, nowclearlytakingoffense.

  
Vanya didn’t know where did it come from.

  
They stayed silent again. The room started to gain its own lights around them, this clarity of the darkness that scares children more than anything.

But they weren’t children anymore so they had to be brave. Of course, Vanya let Five to have priority, he never had a problem taking it for himself anyway.

  
'I wantedto be back foryourbirthday. ' he saidin a rapid tone, hittingoffashfromthe end of hiscigarette.

  
'Ourbirthday.

  
'Yes.

Vanya tried to understand how did Five so easily stepped over the weeks of silence stretched between them but she just hurt herself with the inevitable realization of the difference between their perception of time.

Well, this was the problem, wasn’t it? Meanwhile, she grew distant and felt neglected he was 'here and there’, stealing time from her.

  
'Now what? ' teleported in front of her Five, with hands in his pocket, with a scowl on his face.

  
'Now nothing. I’m going to sleep and I have to take my pills. Tomorrow we talk. Or won't. I guess we see if you will be still here or nah.

  
An incredulous chuckle from his direction.

  
'You’re pissing me the fuck off.

Vanya looked at him searching, again her curiosity overpowering her survival instincts. He did seem mad.

He got taller than her like 3 years ago, and even though he was standing a few steps away from her, somehow, he was still towering over her, his otherwise big greenish eyes narrowed, his lips thinned in his familiar, frustrated scowl.

  
'Can this cursed place just give this one thing to me?

And Vanya suddenly thought she understood.

He needed her to be the one person to whom he makes gestures, with whom he puts that unwilling effort that keeps alive a relationship.

  
She felt herself being too weak, too nice, still with slow steps she closed the distance that separated them.

He was watching her approach with a cold look on his face.

Vanya guessed the reason was that he couldn't be too grateful to her for making him admit to this small dependency. 

  
'But I don’t want to be nice to you. I never get to be anything but nice with everyone. ' looked up Vanya in his face, watching his widening pupils from up close.

Five lips curved into a soft smile.

' Then don’t be nice. I’ve never asked you to.


	2. imagine me and you, i do

' What were you saying ?  ' asked Five quietly ,  eyes fixed  on Vanya’s face ,  his confusion fighting whatever was happening here.

He had the expression of someone who found himself lost in a pleasant place.

' Why are you whispering ?  ' asked back  Vanya ,  keeping her voice even leveled by sheer willpower although she was dizzy with his presence .

She could already feel the smallest sounds magnifying around her, driving her into a panicked frenzy.

He shook his head.

' I  wasn’t …

At the sound of the door banging off the wall, they both winced, Vanya‘s body holding out the trembles a little longer.

It was Luther, looking down on them from his mighty height, a plate of something in his hands and above the steaming food an instant look of disapproval on his face.

' What are you doing here?  Who let you in?

' Forget it .  ' sighed in  response to the look Five gave him .

' You shouldn’t be here.  Especially you ,  Five .  Father asked me to tell you that you will come with us to tomorrow’s mission , and he  doesn’t want to hear your excuses . And  you’re not allowed to disappear this time .

Now that just sounded ridiculous in Vanya’s opinion. And Five’s politely neutral expression seemed to hide the same thought.

Father simply didn’t have the means to contain Five and they both know it.

The awkward silence filled the space around them and Luther didn’t seem to want to move from the door. Did they occupy his room without noticing it?

Vanya let the sense of discomfort wash through her without even rattling her nerves but Five’s patience seemed to fragment rapidly.

He really didn't handle well any kind of captive situation.

' Soo, what are you guys really doing here?

' Is  that comfort food with you , Luther?  ' asked back  Five .  ' Just another laid back  Friday night with a  good movie ?

Luther suddenly appeared smaller with a heavy blush on his cheeks.

The strange thought occurred to Vanya that she hasn’t seen a man blush before and she just realized that she didn't think they were capable of it at all.

How stupid of her.

Does this mean that Five blushed too?

This random thought grasped her with such force that she missed the rest of her brothers' bickering.

' …  she didn't have the right to …

' To what ?  To speak at the dinner table ?  Technically none of  us have it ,  so you might as well get your head out of  your ass and  congratulate Vanya for shaking up your depressing birthday party .

' She disrespected our Father on purpose ,  interrupted him …

' You sound like  such an  ass right now , God.

What Vanya didn't understand was why Number Five kept lingering in the room, spending time arguing with Luther instead of teleporting out of this pointless convo.

Although, she was grateful for it.

She supposed she loved Luther in a lukewarm, sisterly way, but she never really grew to actually  _ like _ him.

In their Father’s universe, he was a double to Vanya’s meek, submissive self; someone just as submissive but with strength and an unwavering sense of purpose.

Sometimes he  filled her with such dread ,  something Five could never understand who only saw a half-witted hulk in  him .

Only those could understand who themselves lacked purpose.

Like Vanya did.

Or Klaus.

As if she conjured him with this passing thought, Klaus passed before the door then backed up with raised up eyebrows.

' What do we have here?  You three look super weird together .  ' determined Klaus  after sizing them up .  ' Oh  Vanya , I  wanted to tell you that I  liked the stunt you pulled at dinner . I  bet it made that old fart  feel alive .  It sure made me .

Vanya felt the eyes of her three brothers looking at her questioningly, wondering if she’s gonna respond this time.

She felt especially heavy on her the gaze of Five and she felt inspired enough by it to say a timid “Thank you”.

By any existing definition, she was so fucking lame.

Especially in contrast with Number Four, the family’s very own black magician/psychic. He was hard to describe and this added to his personal charm.

Regardless , most  people would agree that at the age of  sixteen , Klaus  was a  beautiful child with complete disregard for his own potential ,  who was ready to step on the road of self-destruction with full confidence .

Strangely enough, he got everyone’s support in advance to go through with it.

Vanya was a  little bit in love  with him as much as she was with everyone who represented free-will and  independence for her .

She could rarely communicate her affection for him but maybe this was not a problem since Klaus was more emotionally perceptive than anyone else in the family.

' Guys ?  Why are you all in  Luther’s room ?  ' appeared Allison in  the door too .

She tried hard not to sound neither too possessive or defensive ;  tried to armor herself with the dignity that came with being 16  years old,  but she still clearly was deeply embarrassed by having to stand in one-meter radios to Luther,  while having everyone else around .

' If we really doing this ' took a  tired glance at Allison  Five ' Then I  guess I’m tracking down Diego  too . Diego!  ' walked out of  the room shouting his name .

' You guys clearly have unresolved issues , and  won’t be  able to move on with your lives without closing down  your 15 th year appropriately .  ' explained Klaus  to them kindly .

' Not even me ' mumbled Vanya earning a  faint smile from Allison.

After a dramatic exchange of desperate glances between Luther and Allison who probably planned to spend the rest of the day together, it was Allison who first caved.

' I  guess we meet at Griddy’s ?

++++++++

Griddy’s Doughnuts was the kind of place where you could spend an amazing time but still leave with an inexplicable sense of shame that stuck to your skin all day, like an oily outer membrane.

Of course, Five didn’t have this complicated relationship with the place let’s say, even 2 years ago.

It used to be  pure bliss ,  sneaking out of  the mansion they lived in,  acting out,  recreating their team  that now defined itself in  rebellion against their Father ; rearranging themselves so Seven could play  with them too …

It was all temporary, but it gave relief enough for them to keep going on with their lives.

Gradually they will all found other outlets to deal with the harshness of their home but it was nice of now.

In front of  him, Vanya was enthusiastically fighting with a cream-filled doughnut ,  trying to ignore her personal distaste of  anything that contained concentrated chocolate .

She probably let someone else choose for her and didn’t dare to change the order.

Five really wanted to let her suffer for a little longer but at this point, everyone else was suffering with her.

' God  gracious Vanya ,  just let me finish it for you ,  Agnes will bring you another one .  You like  jellies ,  right ?  ' took the plate away from her impatiently .  ' They are alright .  ' sat back  Vanya in  the booth with instant relief  on her face .

She felt great.

Diego and Luther basically couldn’t breathe at this point, and Allison was basking in her moral superiority over them as she only ate one and a half.

The place was almost completely empty at this hour, only a bigger guy sat by the counter bending over his food, uncharacteristically engrossed in his glazed one.

His focused devotion to his eating was what caught Vanya's attention because she simply believed that people weren’t passionate about anything anymore and glazed doughnuts certainly didn’t inspire such devotion in anyone.

But maybe she was wrong and had misplaced ideas about basic human behavior because in front of her Five sat in the same exact pose, taking huge bites, oblivious to the world.

' What ?  ' asked Five seeing her smiling ear to ear .

' Is  there something on my face ?  ' stiffened Five in mid-motion ,  resisting the urge to touch his face .

' Just your handsome smile ,  as it should always be  there .  ' kissed noisily on his cheeks Klaus.

' You are pretty ' joined Diego Klaus,  checking him out  appreciatively meanwhile still loudly munching .

Five put down his food in disbelief.

' Girls must be  so easy for you ' sighed Diego  begrudgingly .

' Easy for what ?  ' asked Vanya with a  blank face .

' Is  this where this becomes boy  talk and  how can we not participate in  it ?  ' asked Allison.

' He  just called me pretty ' looked at her Five ' Do you feel excluded by this somehow ?

' Guys ' interrupted them Luther  suddenly ' Look .

They all turned at the direction of his nod.

Above the buildings a fat orange mushroom cloud bloomed, getting bigger with every silent moment their brain needed to register what they saw.

' Is  this tomorrow's mission ?  ' asked Five with little hope in  his voice .

When later Agnes came out from her office to make her usual round to collect tips and ask those lovely children if they needed anything else, she found empty tables and some change thrown on them; and the one with straight bangs slowly nibbling on a jelly doughnut alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tend to write angst much easier so I wanted to try something fluffier, more domestic.  
> Also I didn't plan to make Luther a bad guy, guess I'm still judging him hard for locking Vanya up. 😌


	3. so kiss me 'til I'm sorry, babe, that you are gone and I'm a mess

By the time they returned to the mansion the sky turned pinkish again; only this time from the rising sun’s and not from a toxic gas explosion.

That they dissipated successfully; otherwise the whole operation was more of the job of rescue workers than superheroes and Five was bored out of his mind while he helped people to their impromptu shelters and handed out food packages.

He didn’t consider himself an adrenaline junkie but the kind of stimulation that came with terrorist attacks exceeded by far for him the excitement of facing the grandiose, unbiased ruthlessness of natural disasters.

He remembered letting the others walk through the mansion’s door in front of him, staying behind for a few minutes watching the frame of the still darkened building with the eyes of a stranger.

It didn’t take much effort to do so, taking the role of a complete stranger.

Being able to jump through time and space didn’t come hand in hand with the ability to emotionally detach himself from said times and spaces, but he was a fast learner.

And he didn’t consciously choose Vanya as an anchor either, it just happened.

Sometimes when he caught her looking at him, he used her eyes to search in them for the exact time and space he was in.

It was a whole thing that he wasn’t comfortable putting into words or even thinking about.

But the mansion did seem uncharacteristically quiet that night.

Not that the ones who stayed home, Vanya, their Father, Mom, or Pogo would have caused any kind of ruckus on their own, or was Five used to come back to lighten up lively house.

Well, technically, their Father was responsible for some serious mental breakdowns that usually came with loud shouting and breaking of things but Five wasn’t about to give credit to him for that.

They destroyed dinner as they usually did after missions, their silence heavy with exhaustion, and when he walked up to his room on dimly lit corridors; he passed his own door, turned left, and opened Vanya’s door without thinking.

She was laying across in the middle of her bed, her barefoot legs dangling over the edge, her pleated skirt spread and crumpled high around her tights.

She looked like a doll thrown on the sheets, comfortable with being fragile and all.

Five found this so attractive because he could never.

Pull this pose off or be comfortable being openly weak.

' You didn’t come down  for dinner .  ' he  said .

' You guys were late and I  wasn’t hungry .

Sounded plausible enough.

' I  didn’t realize you had  this much leverage with Father .  Now he  allows your absence ?  ' put his hands in  his pockets in  his boyish self-consciousness at her unusual dismissiveness ,  still entertained enough by it to stay .

' A less  known fact that I’m secretly one of  his favorites .  ' said in a  bored tone Vanya ,  turning a  page in  the book she was holding  up above her face .

' I  see ' tried to repress his smile Five , out of  respect for Vanya’s actual position in  the family hierarchy .

' It was a  joke ' looked up at his discreet silence Vanya .

' Oh,  I’m aware .  Scoot over.  ' Five grabbed Fher  bare calves to show  them away and free  up some space for himself on the bed .

' Fluffy ' sighted Five contended when his body  sank into the mattress .

' It’s supposed to be  exactly like  yours .

' Really ?  ' squinted Five disbelievingly up to the ceiling .

He turned his head toward Vanya who now laid on her side, facing his profile.

' You look like  shit .  ' said Vanya softly .

' Back  at you .

She looked tired. Around her eyes, the skin tightened and her eyes were glossy with sleeplessness.

' Don’t tell me ...  ' reached for her abandoned book Five ,  meanwhile also reaching for a  way they can distract themselves ' ... that ...  ' he  quickly read off the title ' ...Tolsztoj is  the one keeping you awake at night .

' Tossing and  turning . I  think he  wants to break me ' Vanya  said keeping a  serious face.

' You know ,  you reading Tolsztoj is  kinda hot.  ' put out  the idea in the universe Five .

Five himself preferred drier academic readings that didn’t venture to the slippery ground of abstract moralization.

He liked to keep his head clear.

' It’s miserably depressing it what it is.

' Shocker .

Despite their difficult relationship their words tangled in a way that it became nearly impossible to touch any sensitive topic, even accidentally.

Both of them understand and breathed in this special kind of freedom, relaxed.

' I  was alone a  lot today so I had  time to think .  Probably too much .  ' started out of  nowhere Vanya ,  as a  catholic girl would start  her confession; a  little apologetic ,  but still forceful in  her right to share and  get rid of  her burden .

Five watched her through half-closed eyelashes ,  the green of  his eyes gleaming with a  silent warning at her ,  to not to overshare and  weight down  their relationship with intimate details he  wasn’t interested in.

As if she understood him and found delight in his vulnerable position, Vanya smiled but kept going regardless.

' There are a  lot of  things I  have never got  to achieve ,  one of  them is  to be  a part of  the team,  as you know . I  thought for my whole life  that missing out  on being a  superhero is  what makes me miserable and  the failure of fitting in  what defines me and  this might be  true to an  extent ...

Five didn’t remember Vanya talking this much in one breath ever.

' ... but from now on I  want to choose how I  get to be  miserable and  then I  realized if I  would have ever been given the chance , I  would have kept you ...

' Would you now ?  ' Five asked back a  little indignant , a  little amused .

Her eyes narrowed at this, gleamed brightly with the sudden rush of words that escaped her, the thrill of it heating up her cheeks.

' Let me finish .  There are other things too but ...  this is important.  She took a  deep breath ,  leaning over  him ,  her lips only hesitating for the briefest moment before touching his .

Parting of  lips and  Vanya looked down  at him ,  taking into the look on Five’s face ;  the amazed eyes ,  the melodramatic , wide-cut ,  slightly parted lips that felt like  she just claimed .

‘Could it be this simple?’ she marveled.

' Come a  little closer ' said Five in a  quiet voice and  as Vanya obeyed and  buried her hands in  his hair ,  her tights straddling his hips ;  his breath caught in  his throat ,  torn between staying passive and  just giving way to his hunger .

The latter seemed way more natural to his instincts but as Vanya’s hand held him down and the other tilted up his chin so she has better access to his lips, he realized he probably has a newly found kink of letting Vanya take things for herself.

It was still difficult for him to fight the emerging aggressivity that usually defined the general way he conducted and carried himself, but now he needed to hold it back in order to give space to Vanya’s own aggression; simply because he found it beautiful.

He was practically feasting on it.

Then for a while, there were no more thoughts, just the bliss of feeling her, following and encouraging her hurried moves, drawing them out so they can deepen.

' I  just wanted ...  ' he had  to pull himself up to be  able to concentrate on her words ,  Vanya still sitting on his lap,  her lips a  little swollen ,  her eyes a  little too desperate .

She zoomed out in midsentence to trace an  invisible line  to his lips then as in a  trance ,  to lean in and  kiss him again.

' ... wanted to do this for so long ' muttered  to herself ,  her gaze almost roaming  on his face with a  proprietary pleasure .

' Happy  to oblige ' sighed Five ,  leaning his head back  on Vanya’s arms folded around his neck .

Five could follow her thoughts without her betraying them even with a grimace.

How she was taken aback by this little gesture ,  how she re-evaluated their position and  found its intimacy almost  unbearable .

He knew her.

He  always did and  the reason why he  wasn’t that shaken up about what they did was probably his deep-rooted ,  never realized conviction that he had  the right to know Vanya in  every way possible .

' You should sleep now .

' You’re probably right .  ' noted Five the complete lack of  his focusing ability and  wavering eyesight .

' You should probably crash in  your room in  case someone ... I’m not trying to throw you out.  ' grinned at the receiving end of  Five’s parodical ,  wounded look .

xxx

Five woke up that night after a good twelve hours of sleep; he was both high alert and relaxed, without a trace of yesterday’s languor.

From the moment his eyes opened to his twilit bedroom, an equation started to emerge in his brain and his fingers were itching after a pen to materialize them and test their probability.

It has been always like this, like being a prisoner of his own thoughts; his brain produced more serotonin in direct proportion to how much closer he got to the solution, otherwise, in every aspect, it was an out-of-body experience.

Five had a hunch that this will be the closest he will ever get to experience a higher power.

Sometimes it was draining to be an atheist.

With a cup of cafe in mind, he got out of bed, and putting on his jacket, he headed straight down to the kitchen area where he found Klaus and Diego sitting in comfortable silence next to their breakfast.

His steps faltered as his mind tried to analyze this cursory observation again, in comfortable silence? but what Five sensed from this was only a temporary glitch, a minor hitch in his thought process, inconsequential next to the problem at his hands, what he could instantly smooth out and write down as distraction.

' You think he...?

Screeching of chairs as they turned their body in Five’s direction who was still going through their fridge’s contents looking for some milk.

Not particularly for the pleasure of their company but more out of apathy towards their general presence he sat down next to them with his cup, scribbling with heavy ink into an old notebook, what he within a few minutes will definitely find limiting.

' Five ,  honey ?

' Yes Mom ?  ' he  threw a  quick smile to her general direction next to the stove .

' Maaan ' whispered Klaus  ' Ha has no idea.

' We didn’t have either ,  why would he?  ' asked back  irritated Diego.

' Nonono  sweetheart ,  one thing is  not like  the other ,  you were a  bad brother to her .  If someone cannot be  held responsible it’s Five .

Five’s glance now jumped between them rapidly, struggling to put together what felt was right in front of him.

' Five ,  honey ' leaned over  the eating counter Mom ,  grasping his hand with her delicate ones .

' Mr.  Hargreeves went out  to get back  Vanya ,  you absolutely don’t have to worry yourself with this .

' Get back  Vanya ?  ' repeated the words Five confused .  ' From where ?

' She’ll be  back in no  time .  ' stretched Mom’s smile even wider ,  slightly distorting her otherwise pretty face .

' In no  time .

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for the accidental grammar mistakes, english is my third language so I came across a few difficulties while writing this fic.


End file.
